The Development Of Deaf Culture In Denmark

The dictionary of Danish Sign Language does not list signs for words, but is instead actually based on language and it explains how a certain sign has to be made and what is meaning is.

The Nordic Council of the Deaf discussed the issue of sign language a lot, especially in relation to bilingualism. Most deaf people born between the 1970s and the 1990s received a bilingual education and are now able to communicate in both Danish Sign Language and Danish language, whereas children born during the previous decades – when the Oralism was at its peak – did not receive an education in sign language and were forced to adopt the spoken one.

Asger Bergsmann, President of the Danish Deaf Association, states that when he was a child, he found it difficult to communicate with the deaf from other Nordic countries, because each of them had its own sign language. For almost twenty years, the Council dedicated a lot of efforts in the creation of a common language, which required a debate on every single word and its corresponding sign – which had to be picked from one of the sign languages spoken in the states members of the Council. In 1967, Denmark was the first country to publish a dictionary containing joint Nordic signs. However, Danes did not really cherish it and felt like they would never use all those new signs. When Swedes decided not to publish their version of the dictionary, the whole project was abandoned.

Moreover, studies claim that, since sign languages are natural, it would be inconclusive to try to create a new language from scratch and expect people to learn it. What I find interesting is that in Bergsmann’s opinion all those years spent on the creation of a new sign language did not go wasted, because they contributed to the exchange of information between Nordic countries and led them to grow together and make major changes in their societies. (Aineisto Viittomakielinen Kirjasto, 2017, p. 1-15)

The opportunity to meet and discover different points of view has allowed Scandinavian countries to progress in this field much faster than the rest of Europe. For instance, in 1970s spread deaf awareness in all Nordic states. Deaf people started to consider sign language as their own, as something to be proud of, and deafness stopped being a stigma.

While spoken languages are based on listening and producing sounds, the sign language is visual. Until those years, most deaf were convinced that sign language was poor only because hearing people said so. In 1978, Lars-Åke Wikström gave a lecture at the Nordic Council Festival in Aalborg and he helped people understand that the deaf had the same rights as the hearings and that they should start demanding equal opportunities, such as education in sign language. A few years after, in 1985, Asger Bergsmann participated in the founding of the European Union of the Deaf, together with the representatives of other eleven countries. He was shocked to find out that the condition of the deaf was backward in many states and deaf awareness did not even exist. In that occasion, the members of the Nordic Council shared their experience and knowledge. Ten years later, the European Union of the Deaf organised a celebration and Asger Bergsmann could not help noticing the progress many other countries had achieved.

As Nordic people had been able to develop together, when the EUD was founded, also the other countries managed to move forward and obtain, for example, the interpreting and subtitling services. Nowadays, Danish deaf people have achieved a good level of equality in terms of rights. According to the Danish Deaf Association, “access to education, work, social networking, cultural offers, events and important information are vital to human development and quality of life”. In fact, deaf people and hard of hearing have now the opportunity to see Danish Sign Language being recognised as a real language, to have interpreters whenever necessary, to contact emergency centres and be informed about public emergencies via mobile phone, to watch sign language and subtitled TV programs every day and to have parental guidance. (Danish Deaf Association, 2019)

The Danish government provides hearing parents of deaf children with specific classes, with the aim of explaining the several ways in which their condition can be approached. There are many schools for the deaf, in which children are educated through the use of sign language, but there are also other options, such as the cochlear implants.

The cochlear implant is a surgically inserted hearing device, which should help deaf people to perceive sounds. It appeared in Nordic countries in the 1990s and, in the beginning, many deaf opposed to it, especially because its safety could not be guaranteed and the rate of death was high. However, over the years, more and more people have chosen to try this solution and today are the implants very common, especially among children. The downside is that by taking this position is the child prevented from the possibility to learn sign language and, consequently, from the chance to grow bilingual.